Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s plan to create 17 new districts has run in to a fresh controversy over the change of the name of one of the districts from Shamsabad to Ranga Reddy and from Viqarabad to Anantagiri.
A day after the Chief Minister indicated that he was inclined to change the name from Viqarabad to Anantagiri citing the public demand, the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen president and member of Parliament Asaduddin Owaisi on Monday wrote a letter demanding that the name should not be changed.
The Government notification had proposed to trifurcate the Ranga Reddy district and adjoining Hyderabad and had promosed to name the two new districts as Shamsabad and Viqarabad. But in view of the fact that KV Ranga Reddy’s native village Moinabad was part of Shamsabad district, people demanded that the district should be named as Ranga Reddy.
Similarly demands were raised by the local leaders that the other proposed district should be named as Anantagiri in place of Viqarabad. However Owaisi strongly opposed it pointing out that Viqarabad was already a prominent town of the district which was proposed to be the headquarter of the new district, it should be named as new district. Both Shamsabad, where the international airport is situated, and Viqarabad were named after the prominent personalities of the Nizam era.
Meanwhile the Chief Minister was holding a series of meetings with the representatives and prominent leaders of different districts to finalise the plans of making the new districts functional.
In the meeting with the Karimnagar district representatives on Monday, the Chief Minister gave his nod to carving out new Sricilla district. Making changes in the earlier plans, the Chief Minister decided not to merge Huzoorabad town of Karimnagar district in neighboring Warangal district.
Simiarly in Warangal district the Chief Minister also agreed to the demand for creation of another district Janagaon. TRS MP B Vinod Kumar, after the meeting told the media that the Chief Minister was favorable to the demand for Sricilla and Jangaon.